"I have bitcoins myself," Reid Hoffman, LinkedIn co-founder and member of PayPal Mafia, told CoinDesk, while describing his reasons for launching a new hip-hop video about central banks competing against cryptocurrency.
Hoffman's interest in Bitcoin dates back to years ago, however, it would be a mistake to group it with the traditional school of evangelists.
"I am a kind of well-managed and pro-government society," he said, and yet Hoffman, a partner at the venture capital firm Greylock, also believes that a small handful of global cryptocurrencies will inevitably arise, because they will allow things that the world wants and needs
"So, that's why I have this, to raise the speech," he told CoinDesk.
The video is a small offer for online discussion about the future of money in a much more attractive format than we usually see. Face actors and rappers who play Alexander Hamilton (the founding father of the United States and first secretary of the Treasury) against Satoshi Nakamoto (the person (or group) who released the code that feeds bitcoin).
HODL rhymes
Hoffman was inspired to make the video by watching the musical "Hamilton."
He wanted to borrow the rap teaching format to improve dialogue on an important issue and felt that the struggle between traditional banking and decentralized capital made sense.
It is an approach that will be familiar to fans of the YouTube channel Epic Rap Battles of History (ERB), the two main characters come and go rhyming key points that support each side and tear down the other.
"As if the banks these days still help people earn money," the ceremonial master who plays Nakamoto, YouTuber Timothy DeLaGhetto, spits in response to the need for banking. "Interest in cryptocurrencies in rapid rise. What is your current interest? As a half percent?
But the pro-banking side can do its best.
Epic Rap Battles member EpicLloyd plays Hamilton, with objections to cryptocurrencies, such as: “Money impossible to track, wow, so smart. A typo in your address and it's gone forever. "
In case readers are not familiar with this particular genre, consider taking a look at Gandhi vs. Martin Luther King, Rasputin vs. Stalin and (this favorite of all reporters) Eastern philosophers vs. Western philosophers
And, in fact, this is not the first time someone borrows the format to present an economic argument. In 2010, economist Russ Roberts joined the Emergent Order group to make a video called "Fear the Boom and Bust" on the economics of contemporaries John Maynard Keynes and (favorite crypto) Friedrich Hayek.
What side are you on?
Regarding this entry into the historical hip-hop canyon, it is difficult not to see the video as pro-cryptography.
https://twitter.com/reidhoffman/status/1169276204924301312
- reidhoffman
The video is full of cameos from the industry Illuminati, like Charlie Lee, creator of Litecoin; Zooko Wilcox-O’Hearn, co-founder of Zcash, Lily Liu, co-founder of Earn.com; Elena Nadolinski, founder of Beanstock; Wences Casares, CEO of Xapo; Ben Davenport, co-founder of BitGo and many, many others.
If people say the video is really just an argument for cryptocurrency, Hoffmann says: "I think I agree with them saying that." But he continued:
“I do think it’s good for the world to have one or more cryptocurrencies, and I think one more of those will be bitcoin or a derivative of it. I think that’s a good thing.”From his early days in technology, he saw companies coming that helped society work in new and better ways. For example, in PayPal, he saw people empowered to accept payments, which paved the way for millions of small businesses.
He saw bitcoin as an opportunity to offer similar new benefits, such as in emerging markets. He said at that time he thought: "This could be super important to help build society as it should be."
But really, the underlying message of the video is not so much the encryption that replaces the banking system, but how the conversation can evolve so that both institutions move forward in a way that improves more lives.
Hoffman concluded:
“What you are really doing is a design goal of how you evolve crypto networks and how you evolve banking systems, so that both are a part of a well-ordered society.”Screenshot via YouTube / Rhyme Combinator
This article is republished from dailycoin.info.